APRIL 1, 1915 



299 



our Oct. 1st and Nov. loth issues I made a 

 report. Well, I brouylit tubers, and also 

 seed, down here in Florida, but so far have 

 entirely failed to get either to germinate. 

 This failure may be oAving' to the very un- 

 usual amount of cold rains we liave had. 

 These little tubers are certainly a very de- 

 licious vegetable; but so far the yield at our 

 Ohio Iiome is not any thing near what is 

 advertised. Although the plants were away 

 above my head, and covered with very pret- 

 ty little "sunliowers," I don't think I got a 

 pint of tubers to the hill, and it was a lot 

 of trouble to get them out of our clay soil, 

 as they are seldom as large as your little 

 finger. As thej^ are surely a nutritious and 

 delicious vegetable I really hope that, in 

 some soils, they may go up to " 2 or 3 hun- 



dred buslinls per acre." Tn our Nov. 15th 

 i.ssue I did not give the Burgess Seed Co. 

 proper credit, because I was told by some- 

 body they were out of business; but I since 

 learn they had only moved their seeds! ore 

 from Allegan to Galesburg, Mich., where 

 their seed-farm is located. They now send 

 out a very pretty little catalog describing 

 helianti, the winter melon, guada bean, etc. 

 The catalog informs me that the reason we 

 did not appreciate the guada bean was that 

 we attempted to cook the mature fruit, 

 whereas it is only the small young ones that 

 are " equal to asiDaragus." etc. As I now 

 take it, you might as well undertake to eat 

 a " ripe cucumber." The Burgess folks 

 guarantee their seeds — no such talk as "after 

 this our responsibility ceases," etc. 



TEMPEEANCE 



" WHAT DO YOU THINK ? " 



Jly dear Brother A. I. Root: — In the last half of 

 the second column on page 875, November 1, I find 

 some questions asked for your friends to answer. As 

 I consider myself one of your friends, allow me a 

 word or two in your temperance department. Vou 

 ask, " What do you think of the man who made 

 money by selling the whisky that caused the poor 

 crazy man to fight with, and kill, his poor innocent 

 hard-working blind wife who was tied up to a 

 drunken husband? " Allow me to ask a question in 

 answer: Would any of the readers of Gleanings 

 think the whisky-seller should work for the United 

 States Government for just a bare living? Do not 

 all Government employees get better pay than that? 

 It is well that we do not forget that the saloon- 

 keeper is a necessity in the economy of these United 

 States if we are to have " half our government ex- 

 penses " paid. See first column of Gleanings for 

 September 15, 1913, page 663. I should prefer that 

 the half of my government expenses be paid by a 

 direct tax ; but so far I have been unable to have 

 my say in this matter. 



Next you ask: "Can any church-member, in the 

 face of the above, think for a moment of voting 

 wet ? " No, I cannot. Tim, di'nr ri'iulfv. wliat is vot- 

 ing wet ? I charge, without fear of successful con- 

 tradiction, that nine-tenths of the voters of the United 

 States did vote "wet" on November 3, 1914; other- 

 wise all the congressmen who stood pledged that this 

 liquor-taxed, licensed-saloon business for revenue 

 should continue, if they were elected, could not have 

 taken a scat at the head of our government. And 

 how many of these were elected by the sovereign 

 voters of the United States? All but one. One 

 ronsTfssional di.strict in California .'^aid tlicir con- 

 gressman should carry his part of this government 

 " dry." And if all the other congressional-district 

 voters could have done their "church-member duties" 

 in the same way this country would have been as 

 dry after the 4th of next March as in Russia today; 

 and this people had the proof that the only way to 

 kill this cursed business was to " knock it in the 

 head." See Gleanings for .July 1, 1914, page 526. 

 It took an Old World monarch to teach us how this 

 nearly one-sixth of the area of this world of ours 

 could be made " dry " in one day — yes, absolutely 

 dry. Shall we heed the lesson? In your familiar 

 call. " May God help." 



Borodino, N Y. G. M. Doolittle. 



PROHIBITION IN KANSAS; BY CONGRESSMAN 

 JOHN CONNELLY 



When I read the American Issue I am 

 tempted to clip for Gleanings from almost 

 every article. I wish our OJiio readers at 

 least would subscribe and read it all. 



To-day we issue a challenge, and feel free in so 

 doing. We dare you to find a community in Kansas 

 where the abolishing of the sale and manufacture of 

 liquor has permanently increased the taxes raised in 

 other ways; where it has increased the crime in the 

 community or contention among its citizens ; where 

 it has increased want and misery among her people, 

 or has made it more difficult for men to reap a rec- 

 ompense for their honest endeavor. I know little 

 about the workings of prohibition elsewhere; but 

 when those who are opposed to the principle desire 

 to point out a place where prohibition has been a 

 failure they must leave Kansas out of their calcula- 

 tions. 



I am glad to speak to-day for the splendid com- 

 monwealth of prohibition Kansas. Half a million 

 boys and girls tread her highways who never saw a 

 place where liquor was legally sold, and a hundred 

 thousand of them never saw a drunken man, nor do 

 they know the taste of liquor. The older genera- 

 tions are not entirely free from the baneful effects of 

 the liquor habit ; but from the loins of that mighty 

 people there is coming into maturity the new gener- 

 ation free from the tyranny of its hurtful reign. 

 May it please God that, with the coming of another 

 generation, we may not only appreciate the benign 

 influence of statewide prohibition, but may we hope 

 there %vill soon be no place where a licensed grog- 

 shop may find lodgment under the protecting folds 

 of the national flag. For this we dare to hope, for 

 this we dare to pray, for this we dare to vote. 



" BY THEIR FRUITS YE SHALL KNOW THEM." 



We take pleasure in submitting the fol- 

 lowing from the Sunday School Times: 



a few weeks ago a Philadelphia man and his wife 

 decided to give up drinking. When the regular case 

 of beer was delivered to the house the woman re- 

 I)nrted that she asked the driver to remove all of the 

 empty bottles that were in the cellar. "Now you 



